I have been a music lover all my life. I love to listen to a great variety of different music styles, including jazz. However, I am so unfamiliar with jazz music, that I don't seem to find the type of jazz music that I like. Honestly, most jazz music I have tried, seems just too noisy, too smooth, or too dull for me.

Most jazz music that I like, was created by pop musicians (because I know a lot more about pop music than about jazz). For example, I love all work by Sade, which is kind of slow jazzy pop music, and I love Matt Bianco, which is more uptempo latin jazzy pop music. I really love the songs 'moon over bourbon street' by Sting, 'Lily was here' by Dave Stewart & Candy Dulpher, 'Kissing a fool' by George Michael (already a bit too smooth for me), 'your latest trick' by the Dire Straits, 'wild horses' by Gino Vanelli, and 'come together' and 'I want you' by the Beatles. I also like Nina Simone, Simon & Garfunkel, The Moody Blues, The Alan Parsons Project, Billy Joel, and several other artists and bands who included some 'jazzy' sounding music in their repertoire.

So my question to you is: what jazz would you recommend me, that is not too noisy (no showing off instrumental skills rather than playing music, and no big bands), not too smooth (I like a bit 'raw' sound, like Blues. Most jazz labeled 'smooth jazz' is way too smooth for me), and not too dull (I'm not looking for restaurant background music).

I would love to hear your recommendations about artists, albums (including compilation albums by various artists), and even individual tracks that you particularly love. I am an audiophile, so I'm not really interested in old (pre-WWII) recordings. Thanks for sharing!

Steely Dan will probably fit well on your list  (if you still don't know them), they weren't jazz artists though, as many others on you list:

or just one of them, Donald Fagen solo:

almost all their albums are of audiophile quality :)

are you interested in instrumental music as well, or vocal songs only (as all artists on your list)?

http://www.jazzmusicarchives.com/subgenre/jazz-related-popart-songfolk" rel="nofollow - http://www.jazzmusicarchives.com/subgenre/jazz-related-popart-songfolk

Yes I also like instrumental music a lot! Thanks for your recommendations so far. I'll certainly check them out!

Thanks for the tip! But I'm also looking for actual jazz now, not just jazz related pop music.

What I like about the Sting song (moon over bourbob street) and 'Lily was here' by Dave Stewart and Candy Dulpher, is that they are pretty minimalistic. I have tried searching for 'minimal jazz' (like minimal techno), but my search didn't give me any results.

I highly recommend two Serbian bands that are jazz and something more: Vasil Hadžimanov Band (Balkan folk motives here, but not excessive) and Fish in Oil (blues, punk and rock in the mix, quite cinematographic at places).

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AA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39CXw-ycXjY

LD: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5wyaauKkjg